Chelsea's Tammy Abraham suffers fresh injury setback

By Ben Knapton, Senior Reporter | 21 March 2021

Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel confirms that Tammy Abraham suffered a setback during his recovery from an ankle injury after missing out against Sheffield United.

Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel has revealed that Tammy Abraham has suffered a fresh setback in his recovery from an ankle problem.

The 23-year-old initially sustained the injury against Newcastle United back in February, but he managed to play 45 minutes against Southampton five days later before entering the treatment room.

Abraham has now missed Chelsea's last six matches, and while there was initial optimism that he may have been ready to face Sheffield United in the FA Cup, he was nowhere to be seen after aggravating his ankle problem.

When asked about Abraham's injury by reporters, Tuchel said: "He quit training yesterday after only five mins of the warm up so there was no chance he could join the squad.

"It is more or less the same injury. He re-injured it a bit in a training accident exactly on the same spot where the first injury was so he is in pain. First he needs to be fit, second he needs to take it step-by-step, train well and fight for your way back.

"The way back is then maybe be a substitute and to be hungry and full of quality in training. These are the next steps but this is not the moment for him to worry abut the first XI because he has been out now for many games and unfortunately for too many games.

"It's absolutely not his fault, he is hungry to come back and he tries all the time. But this is the risk in pushing the players to be back as soon as possible.

"We thought he would be in the squad today but he had the accident in training - it's nobody's fault. Now is kind of a restart and he can use the two weeks to get fit again."

An own goal from Oliver Norwood preceded a Hakim Ziyech strike as Chelsea booked their spot in the FA Cup semi-finals with a 2-0 win over the Blades at Stamford Bridge on Sunday.